The growing pains of Adrian Mole door Sue Townsend

Author: Sue Townsend
Title: The growing pains of Adrian Mole
Publisher: Methuen
Published: 1985
First published: 1984
Motto: “The aristocratic rebel, since he has enough to eat, must have other causes of discontent.” (Bertrand Russell – The history of Western Philosophy) Why I chose this novel: I was looking for a funny book. I told that to my mother and she gave me this book! Summary: Adrian Albert Mole is a fifteen-year old boy who lives in London with his parents and his dog. His best friend’s called Nigel. There’s a war with Argentina and his father wants to take part in it, because he doesn’t like his job. Adrian is obsessed by sex and he wants Pandora to show him her nipple. Pandora thinks this is too fast and she breaks up with him. Adrian finds out his mother is pregnant and he doesn’t like it because he doesn’t want the child become just like him. His American friend Hamish Mancini comes over to see him, but he spends most of his time with Pandora. Adrian gets very jealous because of this. Nigel arranges a date between Adrian and Sharon Botts, but there wasn’t any chemistry. Queenie, the wife of Bert Baxter, an old friend of Adrian (he had to take care of him in the last book), has a stroke and has to go to the hospital. Both Adrian and Pandora went to take care of Bert. Eventually they are together again. Adrian and his parents are going to boring Skegness on summer holiday. Adrian finds out that Doreen Slater, the ex-girlfriend of his father, is also pregnant from his father. His father leaves home to live with his new family at his mother’s home. The rest of the holiday is very boring for Adrian. When the school begins, there’s a new teacher: Mr. Lambert. He is very interested in the students, and he wants to help everybody with their family problems. He does the same with Adrian. Adrian likes to write poems and sends them to John Tydeman from the BBC. Unfortunately he always gets a negative answer. Later Adrian’s sister is born. They call her Rosie. His mother gets a postnatal depression, and there are many problems. Adrian writes a poem on the toilets at school, and he gets grounded for a week. He become a member of Barry Kent’s club, so he spends all day at Barry Kent’s and in the street, but he thinks it’s boring. It’s over again between him and Pandora, and Pandora got a new boy-friend, a nerd called Henderson. Adrian decides to walk away from home to get attention. He’s feeling really bad, because of sleeping on the streets. After a week the vicar’s wife picks him up from the streets and put him into a bed. When he arrives home, he goes to a doctor who says that he has got a depression. Characters: The main character is Adrian Mole. He is fifteen years old. He has many pimples, and they annoy him very much. He goes to school, and he really likes to write poems. Mostly, he send the poems to John Tydeman from the BBC. He is really obsessed by sex. His girlfriend is Pandora Braitwaith. She is really intelligent. He thinks she is a couple social classes higher than him. She is also fifteen years old. They have a very loose relationsship, sometimes it’s on between them, next time you no they break up and vice versa. The story is told from the 4th of April until the 2nd of June. It’s chronological, because it’s a diary. The narrator in this book is the main character. He writes his own diary. Adrian Mole lives in London, in a cul-de-sac. I don’t think it’s a beautiful house, because he often complains about it. In the story, he is most of the time at home or at school. The title is The Growing Pains of Adrian Mole, because the book describes more than a year in his puberty. He suffers from pimples and obsession for sex, he suffers from relationships that won’t work and that nobody likes his poems that much. At the end of the book Adrian is depressed. I think that the title also has to do something with the pain he suffered from the depression. II Extra Assignment A.1

The author of the book is Sue Townsend. She was born the second of April, 1946 in Leicester, England. She had two sisters. When she was young, she liked to read. When she was eighteen, she married and had three children. Later she divorced and married again. First she wrote musicals at the Phoenix Theatre in Leicester. She also had success with her books. In 1982 she wrote the first part of the diary serie: The Secret Diary of Adrian Mole Aged 13 ³/4
This book was very popular in whole europe. In 1988, Rebuilding Coventry, in 1989, True Confessions of Adrian Albert Mole, Margaret Hilda Roberts and Susan Lilian Townsend, in 1991 Adrian Mole: From Minor to Major. In 1993, she wrote Adrian Mole: The Wilderness Years, in 1998 Ghost Children and in 1999 Adrian Mole : The Cappuccino Years. III Own Opinion This book is very funny, and very easy to read. There were no really boring things in it, the story line keeps interesting. Al the time you want to know what happens next, between Adrian and Pandora or with Queenie. This is a funny quotation: “I’ve changed my mind about going to London. According to the Guardian lead pollution is sending the cockneys who live there mad” This is a bit sarcastic humour. And I like that
I also like the poems he writes, they are quite good: “A-tremble on the edge of life, One day to be a mum and wife. But now it’s discos fun and laughter: Why should you care what’s coming after? ” He wrote this poem on his mothers’ birthday card.